Six of the Best: Going GaGa edition

Photo: LADY GAGA! by Joãomagagnin on Flickr

Other CDs may come and go. But Lady GaGa has remained for months in its #6 slot in our car radio. The kids, in the back but in complete control, may tire of listening to Garbage, U2, Phoenix and the Grateful Dead (after one listen) but Lady GaGa remains in solid rotation. Her popularity extends from the backseat of our car to a global audience. She's won two Grammys, and has sold 8 million albums and 15 million singles digitally worldwide. What to think about this global phenom?

1) Loyalty lessons from Lady Gaga: Church of the Customer
Jackie Huba takes a look at Lady GaGa from a loyalty marketing program perspective. She looks at five things that have helped build the passion and loyalty of her fans that also could be/have been used by companies to help build customer loyalty. These include: Giving your fans a name (GaGa's "Little Monsters"/ Fiskar's Fiskateers), developing shared symbols (GaGa's "Monster claw"/ Livestrong's yellow wristbands) and making your customers feel like rock stars (GaGa calls a fan in the audience for a drink after the show/ eBay's Live Conferences have attendees pass a line of cheering eBay staff).

2) Lady Gaga - The Fame Monster Best Buy In-Store: Vevo
All these elements combine to create fans like these:

Meme of the Week: The Norwegian Olympic Curling Team's Pants

Photo: loud and proud by kennymatic (Flickr)

Rally around the pants! There are almost 500,000 fans on Facebook, almost 10% of Norway's population. All because one of the team members picked these crazy pants out of a catalog. Pantastic!

And the pants are either inspiring the Norwegians. Or distracting the competition. They are in the final against the Canadians, taking out Switzerland 7-5 in the semi-finals.

Where is the Speedo of these Winter Olympics?

Photo: Soaza the Schwartz from Shredoptics.com

Where are the equipment manufacturer breakout stars of these Winter Olympics? I haven't noticed anything. Yes, the alpine skiers dutifully take off the skis at the end of their run so we can see the manufacturer logo. But nothing really stands out. Certainly nothing to compare to the splash that Speedo made at the Beijing Olympics. Its LZR swimsuits were so dominant that swimmers wearing Nike and other competitive brands demanded the right to switch. If there are opportunities to make newsworthy innovations in swimsuits, surely there are more opportunities in winter sports?

It was a lot different back in the 1960 Squaw Olympics according to this Sports Illustrated archive article. In those days, the sport was still in its infancy and pioneers like Howard Head, Ed Scott and Anton Kästle were in the stands cheering on their equipment. Is it that, these days, the leading manufacturers have gotten so good at product development that innovations by one company are so quickly matched by the others that they create little advantage?

Perhaps the closest anyone has come to breaking out is Shred Optics, a company started by Olympic Gold Medalist and World Cup GS Champion Ted Ligety. Ted was 5th in the Super-Combined, sporting a Shred helmet and goggles. That gave his company a valuable publicity boost. Unfortunately, he didn't do so well in the GS, his favored event so he missed out on a second promotion opportunity. (The gold medal for successful use of personal endorsement of your own product must go to Li Ning in the Beijing Games. By becoming an important part of the Opening Ceremony, he successfully promoted his shoes, ambushing Adidas, the official Olympics sponsor.)

Or perhaps the breakout will be the Norwegian curling men team's argyle pants? Until the Vancouver games, these pants from Loudmouth Golf were only ever seen on golf courses. But, now that they've crossed over to curling, will they be this year's Crocs? So far, Loudmouth seems blissfully unaware that the Norwegians are making their pants famous. Their site makes no mention of them. Better these pants than anything from ice dancing.

Private Label's gunning for you--better keep moving

Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid chase sequence

This clip from Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid shows the start of one of the most famous (and longest) chases in film history. Whatever Butch and Sundance do, wherever they go, the Pinkertons keep on coming. They try hiding, riding double on a single horse and negotiating an amnesty. None of that works. They get some respite when they throw themselves from a canyon into a river but not for long. Eventually they decide their only option is to move to Bolivia (where they eventually get killed by another posse).

This chase sequence came to mind as I was reading this AdvertisingAge article about consumer packaged goods companies intentions to increase marketing spending to stay ahead of Private Label. Private Label, like the Pinkerton posse, is in hot pursuit, tracking and following every change of direction and taking out all those who stand still and do nothing.

Now to stretch this analogy to its breaking point, the various responses proposed by CPG companies can be categorized with reference to the movie: More coupon spending--that's like asking the horse to run faster. It's only going to work for a short time before the horse collapses. More media spending--will work for a bit longer because at least the horse is getting fed. While meaningful product innovation, that's the one that's like jumping off a cliff. It's more risky but, if successful, can give some breathing room. Just for a while.

Six of the Best: Olympics Edition

Photo: Olympics rings Vancouver by adrian8_8 on Flickr

A little sleep-deprived this week as I, too often, have had to stay up to the last minute of NBC's Olympics coverage to see if Julia, Shaun, Lindsey, Bode... were going to win a medal. What am I going to do next week when the curling competition heats up?

1) NBC's Olympics Coverage Infuriates Sports Fans From Coast To Coast: Yahoo! Finance
NBC is apparently losing $200 million on the Games and it's not gaining many fans with the way it's covering them. This Yahoo! article focuses on people's outrage at NBC's liberal use of tape delay and limited use of live streaming on the Internet. My irritation is with how NBC chops up events, putting all the best bits (finals and showdowns) on at the end of the night to try and get me to stay up and watch as many ads as possible. It's one time when a DVR really doesn't help much. I realize that NBC has to make money to cover what it paid for the rights but I figure it's not my fault that they paid too much so why are they making me suffer? In this race between the bottom line and customer satisfaction, the bottom line has won gold all too easily.

2) Why P&G Is Bringing 18 Brands Together for Olympics Push: AdvertisingAge
And speaking of ads, these Olympics provided the forum for P&G's first ever corporate TV ad in the U.S. The quintessential "house of brands" company has been gradually increasing its multibrand marketing efforts over the years culminating in this new "Thanks, Mom ad" from Wieden & Kennedy.



According to Global Brand-Building Officer Marc Pritchard this is the first of a growing wave of multi-brand ideas for P&G.

3) The Man Your Man could Smell Like: Old Spice



Meanwhile, here's one of the new Manmercials from Old Spice, a P&G brand that is still being given some separation from Olay and some of the feminine rest of the P&G portfolio so that it can do its own thing. This particular ad is already clocking in at over 2 million views on YouTube. An ad that people actually want to watch.

5) Winter Wonder Brand:The New York Times
If the Olympics are all about pomp and circumstance, how do you make them fit with a country that prefers a more low-key approach? Michael Ignatieff, leader of the Liberal Party of Canada, talks here about how the Vancouver organizers have tried to imbue these games with Canadian values- a little less grandiosity and a little more modesty, please.

4) Vancouver's Twitter Lesson: HBR
Unfortunately, weather problems and a series of technical malfunctions led to some people referring to these games as the Glitch Games. This HBR post talks about how one tweet was able to mitigate the fallout from one of the first and most prominent glitches--the uncooperative leg of the opening ceremony's cauldron tower. His tweet: Don't fault us for not getting the torch up in time, Canadians invented insulin not viagra. #van2010 #olympics helped shift the conversation from a #fail direction to something more sarcastic and funny. Meanwhile The Guardian (in the UK) ought to be a little more careful when suggests that these games are the worst ever. The next Olympics are in London and the weather's not likely to be cooperative there either.

6) What to wear with your Three Wolf Moon T-shirt: Murketing

Photo: loud and proud by kennymatic (Flickr)

And, finally, back to curling. Not content with blazing new trails for sports, it's also launching new trends in fashion. Here Rob Walker talks about the Norwegian men curler's pants. Expect to see colorful diamonds, dots and squares in your neighborhood soon.

That's it! Back soon with more stories from the world of brand strategy (and vaguely related areas). More thoughts and comments also available on Twitter (@martinjbishop).

There's a fine line...

Inspired by this from Indexed

Six of the Best: The 'Has Google jumped the shark?' edition

Photo: Google Classic by dullhunk on Flickr

Remember the days when Google was all about search? Well, they're gone. Just this week, Google launched Buzz, a social networking service and announced plans to build an ultra-fast consumer broadband network. It has to do something with all of its money and it's doing it. So, is this the week that heralded the beginning of the end for Facebook and all broadband networks or is this week where Google finally strayed too far from its knitting?

1) Participate, don't Spectate - Google uses White Space: The Phoenix Principle
Adam Hartung makes the case for why Google getting into all these new ventures makes sense. Speaking specifically about Buzz, he says that Google is a "participant" not a "spectator" jumping into the market to try it out, learn and see if there's a way to make sales and profits. He calls s Buzz: "Another stereotypical White Space entry into the market. A product with a lot of possibilities, looking for how to fit into a quickly shifting market, teaching Google more about the marketplace and aiding the company toward maintaining its torrid growth pace."

2) Google risks losing focus amid expansion, analysts say: Computerworld
And the other perspective is: "Google Inc. is a search company that is expanding out from its core business - way out." This article was written back in January when the hot Google news of the day was the Google-branded and designed mobile phone, the Nexus One. None of the analysts interviewed were ready to go on the record with an unequivocal critique of the growth strategy. Dan Olds, an analyst with The Gabriel Consulting Group, was the bravest but even he had a caveat: "When a company participates in a bunch of different markets, there's always the risk that they might lose focus and start to slip in all of their markets. While Google certainly faces this risk, they have a pretty good track record of cutting their losses and bailing out on loser opportunities while sticking with the winners."

3) Facebook To Launch Gmail Killer (?): IanSchafer.com
As Google expands its business into new territories, it find itself coming up against new competitors who are expanding their services as well. This post from Ian Schafer reports on Facebook's plans to launch its version of Gmail. As he says: "Email now, mobile payments later. Email is a huge key to unlocking the full identity association treasure chest. Watch this space." The whole pot is getting stirred up, it seems.

4) ThirdWay Most Effective Ad of the Super Bowl: Google Parisian Love: ThirdWay



The Google Super Bowl Ad got generally very positive reviews with many rating as the best or one of the best ads. David Vinjamuri likes the ad: "Because it is simple, because the execution is tied directly to the brand (unlike other memorable spots, this one you can’t remember without knowing it was for Google), because it tells a story, and because it is a powerful reminder of how Google has changed our lives." I liked the ad too but, in the context of shark jumping, I wonder if its another sign of Google's business evolution.


5) Google's Buzz, Twitter, and the Semi-Public Life: Justin Fox (HBR)
Justin wonders whether Buzz and other social media are a smart use of time and brain cells. he's decidedly on the fence. He worries, in particular, whether: "All the effort of building up a Twitter following is likely to go to waste when something better comes along" but decides that he agrees with Steven Berlin Johnson's take that: "The history of the Internet suggests that there have been cool Web sites that go in and out of fashion and then there have been open standards that become plumbing. Twitter is looking more and more like plumbing, and plumbing is eternal."

6) Introducing the Street View snowmobile: Google Maps



OK. This is cool. Just in time for the Winter Olympics in Vancouver, Google kitted out a snowmobile to map Whistler's ski slopes. The maps and imagery are included a special website that provides lots of other information about the Games.

That's it! Back soon with more stories from the world of brand strategy (and vaguely related areas). More thoughts and comments also available on Twitter (@martinjbishop).

Meme of the week: Boring Movies

Photo: Big Yawn by twob on Flickr

Nothing much was hitting my radar screen this week until, late-breaking, Twitter lit up with lots of suggestions for boring movies (#boringmovies). Samples:

• Some Drivel Runs Through It @word_czar
  
• Good Morning, Virginia Beach @word_czar
• Drainspotting @VanessaKellyAut
• Debbie does Dishes (many)
• Lord of the Ring Road @EdinburghFringe
• Dusty Harry @RevSion
• Lawrence of Suburbia @tweetloaf
  

Customer relationships: Love them or hate them but no room for in-between

Photo: The can of soda I got for £1.80 on Ryanair by dizarillo on Flickr

American readers may not know Ryanair. It doesn't operate in the States. But it's Europe's largest airline, legendary for its cheap flights and its aggressive disdain for its customers.

Which other company would relish the PR it garnered as the CEO announced that he wanted to charge passengers for using the toilet on flights? The list of other customer-unfriendly behavior is long, from its "puerile" charging policies for certain credit cards as well as more familiar-to-Americans charges for bags, drinks and most everything else.

As the Irish Times reports, this belligerence to customers has had its effect. In a recent reputational ranking of 581 companies, Ryanair ranked near the bottom. Still the passengers keep coming in record numbers. Henry Farrell wonders how "shafting your customer" can be an effective business strategy in a consumer-oriented business in a competitive sector?

Some interesting theories are put forward in the comments section of his post. I think "Barry" is right when he says:

"I can think of two – first, the reputation contains a strong implication of ‘cheap’; people who are cheapskates frugal will be attracted. Second, people might figure that they’re smart enough/tough enough to take advantage of the cheapness, without being tagged by the add-on charges. Most, of course, will be mistaken."

Say what you like about Ryanair but, in its defense, it is clear and upfront about its relationship with its customers. Many other companies want to have it both ways and are deeply conflicted. They want customers to love them but they are stuck with business models that their customers hate.

As described by an article in HBR called "Companies and the Customers Who Hate Them:"

"One of the most influential propositions in marketing is that customer satisfaction begets loyalty, and loyalty begets profits. Why, then, do so many companies infuriate their customers by binding them with contracts, bleeding them with fees, confounding them with fine print, and otherwise penalizing them for their business? Because, unfortunately, it pays."

This article reviewed the financial results of companies in a range of industries and showed that many companies depend for much of their profits on customers "shooting themselves in the foot." They make money when people don't act in their own best interests. These companies give their marketing teams the challenging assignment of trying to disguise the unpalatable truth of their business model behind shiny examples of where they are doing good.

These are also the companies, according to Bill Taylor, most likely to suffer in the current climate of "business populism" where people are upset about the economy and want to stick it to the business establishment. He sees this time as being a great opportunity for companies that challenge the norms and accepted practices of business-model-hated industries. He cites two examples: Southwest Airlines, which decided not to charge for checked bags while the rest of the industry was collecting $1.7 billion for doing so and Life Time Fitness, a relatively new company in the Fitness industry.

Life Time Fitness has decided not to follow the industry model of: "Bait-and-switch pricing, punitive contracts, and shoddy service" in favor of a customer-preferred model of low up-front fees and month-to-month membership.

Life Time Fitness CEO Bahram Akradi says:

"Almost everything we looked at in terms of how this industry did business was designed from the club's point of view: What's good for me, not what's good for you. We were treating customers the wrong way, selling memberships the wrong way, serving members the wrong way. So we asked, 'What would this industry be like if we did things the right way? What would a club look like if members designed it? What would the membership offer look like if the customer wrote it? What would the hours of operation be if customers set them? What if we let customers dictate how we did things?' That's why we did away with contracts. A contract makes you fat and lazy. We have to win over every one of our customers every month. It forces us to keep getting better."

So far, this strategy looks like it's paying off. Life Time Fitness is growing quickly while some of its competitors are falling by the wayside. Which other industries could be reinvented by challenging the customer-unfriendly status quo?

Saints vs. Sinners: Super Bowl ad round-up

Congratulations to the Saints. A great game that provided a sometimes distracting backdrop to the real competition--the battle of the ads. I don't think that this year's collection of ads will be remembered as one of the best vintages. Hitting, pantlessness and emasculation were the predominant themes.

1) Brand Bowl 2010 official winner: Doritos (consumer-generated)



I enjoyed camping out at Brand Bowl 2010, designed by Mullen and Radian 6, looking at all the Twitter reactions to the Super Bowl spots. Doritos was the official winner of Brand Bowl 2010 as measured by the volume and sentiment of the Twitter comments, easily beating out Focus on the Family which had been the front-runner before the game started.

This was my favorite of the four Doritos spots aired during the game. The consumer-generated spots aired were the winners of Doritos Crash the Super Bowl Ad Contest which obviously gave them a headstart, from a buzz POV.

2) Best use of old people: Snickers (BBDO)



Betty White and Abe Vigoda were the stars of this ad showing how you're not you when you're hungry. The spot easily beat out the half-time show which featured The Who. Is the NFL ever going to trust someone under 60 with the half-time show again?

3) Most surprising ad: The Late Show with David Letterman



Who would have thought that Jay Leno and David Letterman (with Oprah mediating) would get together for an ad promoting The Late Show? Or that news of this wouldn't have leaked beforehand? Pity that Conan wasn't there as well.

4) Best job ad: CareerBuilder.com (consumer-generated)
The way-too casual Fridays spot thrashing the fiddling beavers from Monster.com

5) Most unfortunate placement: Dockers (DraftFCB)
The Dockers pantless-men ad immediately followed the CareerBuilder.com ad so its pantlessness was unfortunately undermined.

6) Most extreme difference in opinion: Budweiser Select 55 (Momentum)
Bob Garfield ranked this as one of the 5 best in his review saying: "No horses, no babies, no jokes. Just 15 seconds of interesting news." Meanwhile, for more or less the same reasons, this spot found its way to the bottom of the list on brand Bowl 2010, prompting Mullen to offer free creative services to help them make a better Super Bowl commercial next year.

7) The Carrie Underwood award (for hitting the wrong note): Skechers (unknown)
Also a winner for the least effective use of a celebrity spokesperson (Joe Montana). Apparently, this was Skechers first appearance in the super Bowl. It didn't turn out as well for them as it did for the Saints.

Brand Bowl 2010: A handy guide to watching the game

It's here again. Your chance to watch, rate and discuss the super and the not-so-super c.$3 million ads presented in a 3/4 hour show in between some boring football bits. (I wouldn't be saying that if the 49ers were playing, or even the Raiders, but both teams are still mired in failure.) Here's a handy guide to watching (either) game:

1) Brand Bowl 2010: As reported by Mashable, Brand Bowl 2010 is a: "New Super Bowl advertiser tracking site from Mullen and Radian 6 — offers near real-time analysis for an immediate look at pre-, post- and in-game Twitter reactions to the Super Bowl spots everyone will be watching." Pre-game buzz leaders are: Focus on Family, US Census Bureau and Paramount (for the eagerly-anticipated The Last Airbender spot).

2) Adweek Media Super Bowl XLIV: Top creatives will be chatting live during the Super Bowl giving their thumbs up or down as the ads are aired. In addition to this creative, critical chat, the site has news, blogs and commentary as well as Sneak Peeks of the ads themselves. As the ads are aired, AdWeek will start putting them up on the site. Meanwhile if you want to take another look at some of the best Super Bowl ads of the naughties, The Duffy Agency has put together its list.

3) YouTube adblitz: Commercials will also be uploaded as they air on this YouTube channel. Until then, there's pre-game coverage and party recipes.

4) Betting on the SuperBowl: An interesting perspective and analysis from The Keyhole. Its 8th Annual Super Bowl Engagement Survey is designed to: "Predictively measure viewers’ true reactions to brands within the context of the medium." The brands with the best fit, according to the survey, are: Coors, Hyundai, Diamond Foods (Pop Secret), Viacom's Iron Man II. Worst fit: Doctor Pepper Cherry.

If you insist on watching the football, here are some sites that may make that experience more enjoyable:

5) NFL XLIV Super Bowl site: Of course, you could always go to the official site and check out what's going on there. It has news, tweets, photos and you can watch the game online too. (#SB44 is the official Super Bowl tag for Twitter fans.)

6) 8 social media resources for Super Bowl: Mashable created its own list of social media resources. Its list includes: AOL’s FanHouse Super Bowl page is a great resource for Super Bowl news, as are the NFL pages from ESPN, Yahoo, Bleacher Report, Sports Illustrated, and CBS

Enjoy!

Six of the Best: The Facebook and social networking edition

Given the number of things written about Facebook and social networking in any given week, I suppose I could devote every edition of Six of the Best to this topic. Might be a bit boring. But this week, there was enough critical mass of things that I "favorited," starred or otherwise remembered to warrant a special edition, starting with the excellent summary of social networking developments in The Economist. Plus its Facebook's 6th birthday and it just passed the 400 million user milestone. So, why not?

1) A world of connections: The Economist Special Report (via subscription!)
A comprehensive review of social networking. The report charts the rise of online communities from "ghettos for geeks" to "vast public spaces" for millions of people. It says that the two greatest achievements of social networks have been that they have brought humanity to a place that was was once cold and technical and that they have become superb tools for mass communications. The most interesting section of the report for me was the analysis of why Facebook has grown so fast and why, unlike some of the early pioneers (MySpace), it may be impossible to knock it off its pedestal (unless it really screws up).

2) 11 Mind-Blowing Reasons Your Company Needs Facebook: Convince&Convert (via @benasmith)
This list of eleven reasons includes both stats like the average time spent on site (55 minutes), the # of sites using Facebook Connect (80,000 (wow!)) and developments like the algorithm-driven news feed which filters for content based on your interactions with the author in the past, and interactions by your friends with that content. From now on, if you're boring, you won't make the cut.

3) Pepsi push harnesses Facebook potential: Financial Times (via @BrandDigital)
As widely reported, Pepsi is taking a pass and will not be advertising during the Superbowl for the first time in 23 years (which, P.S., has approx 12 minutes of actual playing time). Instead Pepsi is going online with a huge digital campaign. Pepsi is hoping that the direct connection to customers through fan pages and applications will foster stronger and lasting connections between its brands and its consumers. One of its programs is the Pepsi Refresh Project where its giving away grants to fund great ideas.

4) Einstein Boosts Facebook Fan Base With Free-Bagel Coupon: Bloomberg (via brandflakesforbreakfast)


Bloomberg reports on Einstein Bros. Bagels "schmear" campaign launched on Facebook. The number of its Facebook fans shot up from 4,700 to over 300,000 in just one day as it announced a free bagel promotion (apparently, the first ever FB instant print coupon campaign). Free sells!

5) Intel's Social Media Training: Harvard Business Review
All this hoopla! about Facebook must be putting companies still in ostrich-mode into a state of panic. Jeanne C Meister and Karie Willyerd provide some help by posting about the experiences of Intel, a social media pioneer. Includes a link to Intel's social media guidelines that will help address some of these company's concerns about the question of responsible use. Probably, at this point, better to think about ways to participate than refuse to play like the 54% of companies who think that banning access is the right approach.

6) Facebook Homepage Redesign: A Feature Breakdown: PCWorld
Facebook is redesigning its Home Page (again). PCWorld has the details. It started rolling it out this week (starting 2/4) and not all users (as usual) are happy. Here is one group's collective reaction (anonymous-fied):

Status update: Seriously Facebook, what is the deal? everytime I get used to a format, it changes!!! ugh!

Comments:
#1: what is different? Yesterday at 9:03pm

Response: you don't have a different home page? like....completely different? maybe I'm just a lucky one being tested?!?!? LOL! Yesterday at 9:11pm

#2: Mine was different when I logged in tonight too xxx. Wish they'd just leave it alone... Yesterday at 9:18pm

#3: i haven't gotten it yet, but i haven't logged out and back in in a while Yesterday at 9:19pm

#1: nope, unless I am just really clueless :) Yesterday at 9:21pm

Response to #2: so glad you commented. I was beginning to think I was imagining the changes LOL! The rest of you....just wait. You get to figure it all out AGAIN Yesterday at 9:23pm

#4: No, they're rolling it out slowly - I was just reading about it. I don't have the new format yet, but I'm sure will have it foisted on me soon. I hate how they keep changing things just to fricking change them!! Yesterday at 9:24pm

#5: Yea I don't have it either but I have several friends who did get everything changed and for those of you on farmville it messed their farms up badly!! :( Yesterday at 9:27pm

(Note to FB: Might at least want to let people know when you make a change.)

That's it! Back soon with more stories from the world of brand strategy (and vaguely related areas). More thoughts and comments also available on Twitter (@martinjbishop).

Brand Mix: Meme of the week

A new feature. If it had started last week, the award would have definitely gone to the Doppelgänger pix on Facebook. But that's more or less over now, so the first official winner is:

Winner: Urban Dictionary (Facebook Fans (as of 2/5): 279, 400)

As The Christian Science Monitor sniffily says: "The user-submitted definitions on Urban Dictionary are often intentionally revolting passages that appeal to the lowest forms of scatalogical humor." But that's why this meme has taken off. To fully participate, you need to go urbandictionary.com, enter your first name in the look-up box, and then paste the definition as your Facebook status. Given the nature of the look-up results, many will balk at the last step.

Runner-up: The very peculiar Selleck Waterfall Sandwich.

Via Darryl Ohrt who comments: "You don't have to understand it, you only have to respect it. Someday, aliens will look down on our civilization and be confused."

Why a Tsiischili roller coaster ride is scarier than a Chunta: A question of naming

Photo: Roller Coaster - Speed Mouse #1 by Stéfan (Flickr)

Do people think that a roller coaster ride called Tsiichilli would be more exciting, more adventurous and more likely to make them sick than the much easier-to-pronounce Chunta? Yes, they do.

Do companies with easy-to-pronounce ticker symbols (e.g. KAR) do better than companies with difficult-to-pronounce ticker symbols (e.g. RDO) in the first day (and even year) of trading after an IPO? Once again, yes they do.

Earlier this week, I wrote about the work of Song & Schwarz who have been looking at the influence of what they call "seemingly irrelevant" things like print font on our perceptions and behaviors. Complicated fonts tax our limited processing abilities, reduce our processing fluency and make us think that whatever is being described is more difficult than we would if it was presented in an easier-to-read font.

Same for names. In the second half of their article, Song & Schwarz describe one of their experiments where they tested made-up names for food additives. The hard-to-pronounce "Hnegripitrom" was perceived to be harmful but also more novel than the easier-to-pronounce "Magnalroxate." The Tsiichilli ride was scarier than the Chunta and a basket of stocks of companies with easy-to-pronounce ticker symbols outperformed a basket of companies with trickier symbols.

This strong link between fluency, familiarity and risk perception has practical implications. As the authors point out, in product domains where safety is important (like food and insurance), there should be a strong preference for easy-to-pronounce names that can be reassuringly, easily processed. On the other hand, in extreme sports like bungee jumping or wherever people derive pleasure from the risks involved, hard-to-pronounce names will add to the promise of adventure and excitement.

One final tip from this article: Things that are easier-to-read receive less scrutiny from a reader than things are difficult to read. Product manufacturers tempted to hide deceptive information in the fine print actually make it more likely that the deception will be noticed. For those going down that track, better to put the deception right out there in front of people, in an easy to read format for them not to see.

In questions of perception and behavior, font matters

Photo: Half Futura, half Comic Sans by Nick Douglas (Flickr)

Behold, the power of font to influence perception and change behavior! An article by Hyunjin Song and Norbert Schwarz in the February edition of The Psychologist shows that fonts can significantly influence people's assessment about how easy or difficult things are to do.

Take a look at this example:

When Song and Schwarz presented these exercise instructions in Arial, readers guessed that the exercise would take 8.2 minutes to complete. When presented the identical instructions in Brush Script MT (which wasn't quite as hard to read as in this technologically-constrained example), they guessed it would take 15.1 minutes. Plus they were more willing to incorporate the Arial-presented exercise into their daily routine. Implication: If we want people to adopt a new behavior, the instructions don't just need to be semantically clear, they also need to be visually easy to read, otherwise the behavior will seem too demanding.

It's all to do with what the authors call "processing fluency." We don't have unlimited brain processing power (just like my home computer, we don't have enough RAM). If something is written well and it's easy to read, people are able to process the information more easily and will feel more at ease with the thing that's being described. If it's too complex, even if it's just the font that's difficult to read, it starts taxing our circuits.

Other experiments show that a font also influences whether people make decisions or not. Researchers tested people on their ability to choose between two cordless phones. 17% of people tested postponed choice when the font was easy to read, 41% postponed their choice when the font was difficult to read. For more than twice as many people, the difficult-to-read font was enough to stop them taking a decision.

Another interesting finding from this experiment was that, if the participants were told that the information about the phones might be difficult to read because of the print font, the difference between the two groups was completely eliminated. People are apparently quite sensitive to their feelings of ease or difficulty but not so good at figuring out what's driving these feelings. Fonts have subliminal power!

Does this mean that the only good font is a simple font? Not necessarily. Song and Schwarz talk about another of their experiments where they tested people's reaction to a Japanese recipe, once again using an easy-to-read font (Arial) vs. a difficult one (Mistral). In this case, the participants assumed that the difficult-to-read recipe would require more time and skill to prepare than the easy-to-read recipe. That might deter someone from trying out the recipe at home but it also might make them pay more for it at a restaurant.

These experiments are a useful reminder that fonts have functional as well as aesthetic value-- something to bear in mind if tempted by fonts exotic but impenetrable.

(Thanks to the pointer from Mind Hacks)